Need some inspiration to do the deed like scrapping the grass? Taking out the lawn is a very dramatic step in our land of personal paradise (Los Angeles), but the drought can be tolerated with beauty and vision. I have some gardens on display from Ojai, around town, in the desert and in my backyard. Okay so I popped Greece and Provence in there, I can't help myself. Here's a handmade batch of pictures from my iPhone. To help you get the idea!
Before
My courtyard goes from grassy nowhere to rocky somewhere vacation spot
Gardens On The Rocks - Palm Springs has always rocked it and now grass as in lawns are becoming politically incorrect. To blend style with raw rock is an art and an interesting way to see how nature dictates style. Here are some rocky elements on streets in the desert, Ojai and LA and Malibu.
The Ranch At Live Oak
Malibu
Palm Springs House
Ojai Scapes blending the best of Southern and Northern California Styles from Craftsman to Spanish With Rocky Accents
Before this great drought conversation, I always loved the spare and sublime desert like garden here and there. From Ojai, Palm Springs, and Los Angeles, South of France, I like my gardens on the rocks.
Don't believe California has fall color? Neither did a Vermont friend, so I took her on a quick trip to Mammoth last year so she could see for herself. She was surprised. Timing and elevation are everything, of course, so if you're planning a trip this year, know that colors are beginning to appear at higher elevations. In fact, Rock Creek may be at its brilliant best this weekend. From our trip last year, here's what we saw along with some early color reports from this month.
Here's a sample of women entrepreneurs and iconoclasts who made their mark running companies, designing homes or managing non-profits and yes now Hip Hotels. They harbored hotel design fantasies and also fell in love with place. As a result, women are curating travel style with their individual passion and values as part of the room fee. Below are some stylish Boutique Hotel women owned hotels by intrepid globetrotters, environmentalists and fashionistas. These women entrepreneurs opted for a flip flop life, Eco Luxe hotels and the vision to pull it off. I begin this section on women boutique hotel owners in Mexico and Spain. I will venture to South Africa, Morocco and other exotic points in my next post.
"I am a real world drop out, " Lisa Harper former CEO of Gymboree told me. "I bought a piece of land in Todo Santos while I was running Gymboree. I had it for a few years. I was living in Sonoma and knew I wanted to be in Mexico and create this dream I had of building and running a hotel. I got up and drew a picture of it. Next thing I knew, I was down there and everything I needed came to me. From the contractor to the yoga & surf instructors, even the chef from French Laundry all wound up on my team. It was a manifestation of magic on all levels." Lisa's barefoot mentality is evident in the way she styled the hotel. Hammock gardens, beach beds, straw hats and fire pits, it's a family party and a true surf and yoga spot.
Yoga and surf instructors pour drinks too!
Boutique hotel style
From Yoga & Surf Retreats to Hollywood Iconic Glamour- Women Hoteliers Slowly Take Charge. Ava Started A Mexican Trend
Remember Ava Gardner’s closed off -season hotel in Night of the Iguana when Richard Burton, the drunk priest came crawling back to her after falling off the wagon with a bus load of spinsters and a tempting Lolita needing rooms on the Pacific Coast? Now women know it's about you, your state of excellence, preserving your inner yogi, lover, chef, eco activist and interior designer and and yes, your inner Ava Gardner.
Check in to this hideout- Ava Gardner Takes Over Hotel As Needed
A Woman And Her Elegant Boutique Hotel From Hollywood Royalty
Janice Chatterton
A love nest of Richard Burton's in the town of Puerto Vallarta was purchased by Bay Area Software entrepreneur and mogul Janice Chatterton. She restored what was known as Casa Kimberley for one of Burton's wives, and turned it into the church of bon vivants and lovers where food, wine, fetes and sensuous getaways are about a the lush colonial architecture, the history of the characters that lived there and the pure charm of the villa. There is even a private church, creative cocktail parties, ubiquitous bougainvillea and slow romance from the past and present.
Hotel Design- Janice Chatterton
Her Journey
Chatterton’s hands-on approach to remodeling and decorating the Hacienda’s collection of sixteen unique suites demonstrates a painstaking attention to detail which can take decades to develop, even among the most accomplished designers. Surprisingly though, she has no formal design background, and upon making the decision to relocate to Mexico in 2000, she possessed only the most basic of conversational Spanish skills. Her remarkable success as a hotelier and designer can be attributed to an innate creativity, tenacity and penchant for perfection.
Born in Eastern Oklahoma, Chatterton spent her teenage years in central California, and started a family before settling in the Bay Area at age 30. A risk-taker from the get-go, she pioneered the creation of telephone-based trivia years ahead of the curve in the early 1980’s. Initially inspired by her interest in astrology, Chatterton began researching software that could support interactive telephone gaming and trivia after hearing about a highly successful horoscope phone line that was in operation at the time. Eventually, she created a first in phone equipment: mass-marketed interactive gaming technology. Her highly successful company drew scores of devotees through its family-friendly content, helping to firmly establish her as a successful entrepreneur operating on the vanguard of communication trends. After nearly a decade in the business, she began to taper her involvement to a minimum in order to travel the world and enjoy the fruits of her successful start-up.
Chatterton began spending time relaxing and traveling with family and friends. An initial visit to the Mexican coastal town of Ensenada helped to jump start her affinity for stays South of the border, but it wasn’t until her second trip to the country that she was able to visit Puerto Vallarta, a city that would spur an ongoing love affair with Mexico. Says Chatterton, “I visited several Mexican cities over the years, but I always kept a special place in my heart for Puerto Vallarta. It resonated with my spirit every time I came back.”
Eventually, her enduring love for Mexican culture and design persuaded her to purchase a vacation home in Puerto Vallarta. Situated along the world-famous Bay of Banderas, the city’s rich mix of cultural tradition and modern comforts, as well as its bourgeoning art community seemed to be a perfect fit for her interests. In 1990, she began touring properties throughout the town, and soon fell for Casa Bur-Sus, a hillside villa with a glamorous Hollywood pedigree. Originally purchased by Sir Richard Burton for his wife Susan as a Valentine’s Day gift, the four bedroom villa embodied coastal charm and authentic Mexican style. Chatterton soon began splitting her time between San Francisco and Puerto Vallarta. A decade later, she decided to make Mexico her full-time home.
Though Chatterton had no formal design background and was not fluent in Spanish, she headed up an extensive renovation of Casa Bur-Sus creating a stunning property rich in both authentic details and modern luxuries. By the end of the project, she fell in love with the renovation process and became confident in her natural prowess as a designer, and when she was presented with the opportunity to purchase an adjacent three bedroom villa, she eagerly pounced on it. After a thorough renovation, the villa was re-named Casa San Angel and when combined with Casa Bur-Sus, the two villas formed Hacienda San Angel’s original eight room property, which opened in 2003.
As a girl, Isabel Goldsmith, daughter of flamboyant industrialist Sir James Goldsmith, was raised in hotels. She considered herself Isabel at The Plaza, and was fortunate to learn about hotels from some of the world’s best. Instead of hiding in a villa on the French Riviera, she wound up pitching a tent alone in her twenties on the wild Costa Allege up road from her legendary grandfather’s resort Las Hadas where the movie “10,” was filmed.
I spent a day with Ms. Goldsmith and could feel the resort as an extension of her history, life story in a visual and intangible way. In the sweltering heat as our guacamole wilted, she spoke a firm yet aristocratic Spanish to her staff. I felt a little unsure about the setting and her role. As we spoke, I could feel her vulnerability and love for the land in a way that was more feminine and surreal. She had the color pink splashed through out her beautiful palapas and the colonial plaza. It reminded me of my room as a little girl with canopies and pink and blue. The princess aspect was evident but also a fierce commitment to the land. She had been on the land for many years and I could feel her childlike spirit still smoldering in the Mexican heat.
Her father, Sir James Goldsmith left an eccentric shadow all over that part of the coast, but Isabel's rugged individual verve in her early twenties planted her there in a way that is quietly being ecologically influential. It is a nest for celebrities though. When I was there Annie Lennox was prancing around with a beautiful smile comfortable, relaxed and exuberant. She even built a gym for Robert Di Niro. As a woman exploring the globe for visionaries that are often men, I thought she was an inspiring person for me to reveal in the world of resort development. On her good taste, guts, instincts and love for nature, she quietly has created a hideaway that is in a way her own principality and her child.
''Just thirteen guest rooms on 1500 beautiful acres... Thank Isabel Goldsmith, Las Alamandas' visionary owner... She's left the rolling forest, estuaries and beaches in their pristine state, adding six fanciful villas... to create a compact luxury hotel enjoyed by a fortunate few.''
Another Slow Boutique Hotel owner and ran from big cities like London and New York to the soulful surf of Mexico with a very modern style keeping Mexican color and simplicity through a refined British lens offering fresh confident design and another place to chill with a surfboard, counter cultural aspirations from surf lessons to painting.
Casa de Chilicote, part of the Hotelito and very similar to Jenny Armit's own Photo: Edina van der Wyck
A blue agave plant in Armit's garden Photo: Edina van der Wyck
El Hotelito and Armit's house in the midst of banana palms and ancient mango trees Photo: Edina van der Wyck
Armit found the cream Florence Knoll sofas in her living-room at a London auction room. The rope chest of drawers is by Christian Astuguevieille Photo: Edina van der Wyck
This boutique hotel is on an island in the Caribbean owned by Sandra Perez, an artist, screenwriter and painter as well as muse to Pablo Milanes, the Cuban singer. Sandra has lined the walls with original works—hers and other Cuban artists—, personally designed the furnishings and named the rooms after inspirations: Ilusión (Illusion), Amanecer (Dawn), Sentido (Feeling)É. She is about art and beauty and nature and why wouldn’t she be. Her utopia is surrounded by blue inspiring Caribbean water.
Her Journey
One of Sandra’s aspiration as an author was to be able to write by the sea. Her dream place had also to be isolated, serene and the sea should provide ever-changing shades of blue from turquoise to deep indigo. On one memorable day, she landed in Cancun, and her attraction to the land of the Mayas was immediate and overwhelming! Little did she know then that her dream place was right there on an island where Mayas lived from time immemorial: Holbox Island… little did she know till she disembarked on this enchanting island. Nothing she ever saw was more delightful than the game nature effortlessly played with colors, the charm of the people who lived there - the barefoot fisherman with golden sparking smiles - the women weaving rainbow “hamacas” while wearing high heels stoutly implanted into the sand.
Mesmerized she thought: “ I must do something here!” Slowly a project started to germinate and to take root. Today, on the beach, facing the sea with an ever-changing shades of blue, this project has become a reality, she calls it: “A Hotel with a Human Sensitivity. Our pride is the way we have designed the environment for our guests through every details, from our art gallery filled with paintings to the beautifully designed and crafted furniture in each individual room.
We enhance the senses through emotions, poetic sensitivities, through the rainbow of “hamacas” swinging with the breeze, the rich scent of fresh coffee, the sea visible at every angle, gastronomically enchanting dinners by candle light; like colour strokes on a canvas, this place becomes magical, it becomes “The Space for your Dreams”
Holbox is part of the natural protected area of Yum Balam, that includes 154 000 hectars of protected areas, home of unique species. Non only it is here that the turtles spawn, the pink flamingos migrates, theterns soar, the white pelicans hunt, the different types of iguanas crawl, the crabs jog sideways, the dolphins surface, it is here that the wale sharks mate and gently wait for you to come play with them.
Spain's British Import
Slow Hotel Pioneer
Charlotte Scott- Trasierra
Trasierra, is nestled above in Seville Spain and was restored by a young British mom Charlotte Scott with her husband, and then just her and her kids. She moved the family from London in 1978 and has been growing and handmaking the structure in the most stylish and slowly luxurious way. Parts of the building date back to the 15th and 16th centuries.
The house stands in a 350 acre private estate, although the original property was much larger. It was a winegrowing estate up until 150 years ago when the vines were prooted and the olives planted.
It had been abandoned for 30 years when the Scotts found it in 1978 In 1979 they moved in without a telephone or electricity. Over the next ten years they restored parts of the roof and outbuildings, installed electricity and telephones and had four children, Gioconda, Jackson, George and Amber who were all raised and educated in Spain. Charlotte Scott has been working on the restoration and renovation ever since and continues to add new rooms and gardens to this day.
Italian For Beginners: The Story Of La Bandita (Marie Claire)
What happens when you leave big-city life to open a hotel in a picture-postcard village in Tuscany? You open another one.
(Ondine partnered up with her hubby, but let's face it La Bandita is glorious)
Each woman is dedicated to the land, their community and have completely reinvented their life with and without families. The adventure of their lives are an inspiration for us to visit and explore and imagine for ourselves. A slow cultivation of a dream, the land, the structures and the wishes of guests. It's an intuitive natural fit for both hotelier and guest. Hats off to these interesting worldly women!
So what is the Not So Big idea? Let's dive into the mind of Sarah Susanka, architect, thought leader and author of "The Not So Big Life" who has pioneered a movement around less is more with regard to home building in her first book, "The Not So Big House," and the feeling of being at home in one's life in her current publication, The Not So Big Life. She was a media darling and early proponent of a more sensible spare approach to buildings, life and environment in the late 90's and soared to the top of minds that matter with profiles in Newsweek, Fast Company etc. etc.
The Not So Big Life reveals that form and function serve not only architectural aims, but life goals as well. Just as we can tear down interior walls to open up space, The Not So Big Life shows us that we can tear down our fears, assumptions and conditionings in a way that opens us up to new possibilities so we can start engaging the things we long to do.
Sarah Susanka -Not So Big Author, photo by Cheryl Muhr
Q: What is a Not So Big Life?
A: A Not So Big Life is one in which you learn to listen to what your heart longs to do, and to integrate these passions into your everyday life. By making time for what you are truly passionate about, and by letting go of old behavior patterns that cause you to keep feeling trapped by life, shifts will occur that allow you to learn more about who you really are and to live each experience as it comes, engaging it completely.
A Not So Big Life begins a process of inner transformation. It happens simply because when you engage what you are truly passionate about, you are automatically present in what you are doing — you are showing up completely in your life and in each moment. Life becomes a natural expression of what you love to do — of your true nature. Through this process, you’ll find more meaningfulness, vitality and that sense of being “at home” in life that so many people are searching for today.
A Not So Big Life gives you more room to breathe and to engage the things you really love rather than living in the past or the future all the time, dreading the next activity and feeling drained because you’re not even sure why you’re doing it. It shows us the way to become “human beings” rather than “human doings.”
Q: How will you know you’re living a Not So Big Life?
A: You’ll find your life will morph from being too big, too fast and too frustrating, to a vastly more manageable pace and clarity. Time will no longer be a foe to do battle with, but will start to flow and open in unexpected places that allow you to fully engage what’s in front of you, as well as in the things you care about.
The unexpected revelation of The Not So Big Life is that it is entirely within everyone’s reach. It requires no extraordinary measures to attain, other than to pay attention to what is actually happening, to look at things a little differently, and to use each
Page 1 of 4 experience to help you see who and what you really are. It is a life in which every moment and every experience becomes your teacher; and the result is a life that is rich, and full, and extraordinarily satisfying.
Q: Why should people read The Not So Big Life?
A: I really believe we’re at crisis point. We find ourselves more and more taxed by daily circumstances, and less and less able to understand what is moving us. We’re over- stimulated, racing through our lives on fast forward and running on automatic, all of which deprive us of the very nourishment we need to thrive.
This book provides an important key to resolving these frustrations and will give readers a method to tackle their everyday lives in a new way. The Not So Big Life puts the tools for transformation into your own hands, so that you’ll have the ability to recognize what’s missing from your life and understand what’s needed to remedy the situation.
I think we will find the book’s audience enormous and extremely varied in its characteristics — from a top executive in a Fortune 500 company to a working mother and everything in between.
Q: How does Not So Big relate to house design?
A: “Not So Big” encapsulates an attitude about life and house design. My previous books have attracted an audience of people who care deeply about the quality of their lives, rather than sheer quantity of what they own.
A Not So Big house focuses on quality of space rather than quantity. It inspires its inhabitants everyday, serving as both a personal expression and a reflection of the homeowners. It’s about feeling comfortable and inspired, rather than impressing the neighbors. In terms of size, it’s typically about one third smaller than you thought you needed, but just as expensive — with dollars reapportioned out of square footage and into character and tailoring for the way we really live.
Q: Is there a common message in your house design books and The Not So Big Life? If so, what is it?
A: It’s this: We are all searching for a sense of home, but we are searching with the wrong tool.
The messages in all my books are very similar in nature, but in The Not So Big Life the medium is life instead of house and the dimension being reconsidered is Time instead of Space.
In house design, we’re searching with square footage, when in fact the sense of home has almost nothing to do with size. To be at home in our lives we have to feel a sense of meaningfulness that derives from being completely engaged in and delighted by our daily activities. And that comes from the quality of our experience in those engagements, not the quantity of things done or goods accumulated. So the parallel message in The Not So Big Life is that we’re searching with constant activity, when in fact the sense of being at home in our lives has nothing to do with WHAT we do. Instead it has to do with HOW we do everything. We have to actually show up in what we are doing — to really be there; which requires that we learn some new behavior patterns.
Q: Why did you write The Not So Big Life? How have you made the transition from house design to life design?
A: As an architect, it’s natural for me to recognize the order that underlies what we see on the surface of things. Architects have a unique ability to perceive the underlying order of things — whether that’s the structure of a building or the dynamics of a conversation. This underlying order is what I see and understand in house design. Now, I’m exploring the underlying order in life design.
Through observing, studying and personally living a Not So Big Life, I’ve been able to understand and articulate the lessons I’ve been learning. I’ve learned that life is the true teacher of how to live more fully and when you learn how to pay attention, its lessons are delivered to your doorstep daily.
For example, in The Not So Big Life, I describe an epiphany when I realized that if I didn’t make the time to write, I’d never have the opportunity to pursue my primary passion and my true heart’s desire. Without knowing how it would work, or how my work as an architect would get done, I simply started to write. By giving myself permission to take the time to write, I allowed myself to start living what I now call a Not So Big Life — a life that is attuned to revealing ever more of one’s true potential. Once you make the commitment to yourself, everything else works out — not in a way that you can imagine ahead of time, but in a way that perfectly supports who you are becoming by following your heart’s desire.
Q: How have your house design books been embraced by readers?
A: It’s extraordinary to experience just how powerfully these books have affected readers.
Although the series has been ostensibly about architecture, many readers relate to these books as guides for how to live a life well. I hear from thousands of readers each year about how much richer their lives have become as a result of my books. It has been truly life changing for many.
The Not So Big House quickly climbed to number one on Amazon.com in all categories shortly after its release in 1998. NotSoBigHouse.com has an average of 40,000 individual hits per month and an engaged audience from around the world. It is an important tool that allows readers to find the resources and support to make their own home “Not So Big.” I often describe the books as the seeds of the idea, and the Web site as the tree. Although the Web site is perhaps less visible, it plays an important role in the success of the “Not So Big” movement.
Luxury is a state of mind. It is also subjective and relative to how you live your life and what makes you feel inspired. The term Bohemian applies to unconventional and artistic. It isn't necessarily a hippy thing it's more of a free spirit and spirited way of living. Here are some images on how to live in your own version of luxury plucked out of travel images, furniture stores, homes, designers and designs. Forest and sea give us balance, find the poetry in nature and poetry in your luxury.
Outdoor | Summer
What makes you want to throw on a sarong & give up your inhibitions? Good wine, a casual luxury being in your own skin and enjoying a sunny locale. Getting out of town and being yourself or wrapping up in nature and relaxing?
Seasonal Expressions
Outside In
Interior Life Objects Found
Space Created
Paolo Soleri
Axel Vervoordt
Casa Midy House in Mexico
Reclaimed wooden table @ The Ranch @ Live Oak
Malibu
Simple mattress with linens from Room & Board - layers of colors muted and luxe with a splash of handblock textile from a bolster and an card from italy framed in white Pottery Barn Casa Wendy
Kathryn Ireland images- Brit Boho Designer
Simplicity + casual international flair can transport the spirit. From a home in California to a beach club in Turkey, I see barefoot luxury everywhere.
Tire to table garden on house boat in Amsterdam not tired simply creative
I just got back from a weekend in Mammoth where clearly, the Autumn action is on in the mountain valleys near water sources and the spectacular terrain. In the Winter it's all about the mountain too because the town is a smattering of A Frames, oddball bakeries, ski shops, a ChartHouse here, a Whiskey Creek there, but what a gorgeous spot to be outside all year.
Here's a sample of women entrepreneurs and iconoclasts who made their mark running companies, designing homes or managing non-profits and yes now Hip Hotels. They harbored hotel design fantasies and also fell in love with place. As a result, women are curating travel style with their individual passion and values as part of the room fee. Below are some stylish Boutique Hotel women owned hotels by intrepid globetrotters, environmentalists and fashionistas. These women entrepreneurs opted for a flip flop life, Eco Luxe hotels and the vision to pull it off. I begin this section on women boutique hotel owners in Mexico and Spain. I will venture to South Africa, Morocco and other exotic points in my next post.
"I am a real world drop out, " Lisa Harper former CEO of Gymboree told me. "I bought a piece of land in Todo Santos while I was running Gymboree. I had it for a few years. I was living in Sonoma and knew I wanted to be in Mexico and create this dream I had of building and running a hotel. I got up and drew a picture of it. Next thing I knew, I was down there and everything I needed came to me. From the contractor to the yoga & surf instructors, even the chef from French Laundry all wound up on my team. It was a manifestation of magic on all levels." Lisa's barefoot mentality is evident in the way she styled the hotel. Hammock gardens, beach beds, straw hats and fire pits, it's a family party and a true surf and yoga spot.
Yoga and surf instructors pour drinks too!
Boutique hotel style
From Yoga & Surf Retreats to Hollywood Iconic Glamour- Women Hoteliers Slowly Take Charge. Ava Started A Mexican Trend
Remember Ava Gardner’s closed off -season hotel in Night of the Iguana when Richard Burton, the drunk priest came crawling back to her after falling off the wagon with a bus load of spinsters and a tempting Lolita needing rooms on the Pacific Coast? Now women know it's about you, your state of excellence, preserving your inner yogi, lover, chef, eco activist and interior designer and and yes, your inner Ava Gardner.
Check in to this hideout- Ava Gardner Takes Over Hotel As Needed
A Woman And Her Elegant Boutique Hotel From Hollywood Royalty
Janice Chatterton
A love nest of Richard Burton's in the town of Puerto Vallarta was purchased by Bay Area Software entrepreneur and mogul Janice Chatterton. She restored what was known as Casa Kimberley for one of Burton's wives, and turned it into the church of bon vivants and lovers where food, wine, fetes and sensuous getaways are about a the lush colonial architecture, the history of the characters that lived there and the pure charm of the villa. There is even a private church, creative cocktail parties, ubiquitous bougainvillea and slow romance from the past and present.
Hotel Design- Janice Chatterton
Her Journey
Chatterton’s hands-on approach to remodeling and decorating the Hacienda’s collection of sixteen unique suites demonstrates a painstaking attention to detail which can take decades to develop, even among the most accomplished designers. Surprisingly though, she has no formal design background, and upon making the decision to relocate to Mexico in 2000, she possessed only the most basic of conversational Spanish skills. Her remarkable success as a hotelier and designer can be attributed to an innate creativity, tenacity and penchant for perfection.
Born in Eastern Oklahoma, Chatterton spent her teenage years in central California, and started a family before settling in the Bay Area at age 30. A risk-taker from the get-go, she pioneered the creation of telephone-based trivia years ahead of the curve in the early 1980’s. Initially inspired by her interest in astrology, Chatterton began researching software that could support interactive telephone gaming and trivia after hearing about a highly successful horoscope phone line that was in operation at the time. Eventually, she created a first in phone equipment: mass-marketed interactive gaming technology. Her highly successful company drew scores of devotees through its family-friendly content, helping to firmly establish her as a successful entrepreneur operating on the vanguard of communication trends. After nearly a decade in the business, she began to taper her involvement to a minimum in order to travel the world and enjoy the fruits of her successful start-up.
Chatterton began spending time relaxing and traveling with family and friends. An initial visit to the Mexican coastal town of Ensenada helped to jump start her affinity for stays South of the border, but it wasn’t until her second trip to the country that she was able to visit Puerto Vallarta, a city that would spur an ongoing love affair with Mexico. Says Chatterton, “I visited several Mexican cities over the years, but I always kept a special place in my heart for Puerto Vallarta. It resonated with my spirit every time I came back.”
Eventually, her enduring love for Mexican culture and design persuaded her to purchase a vacation home in Puerto Vallarta. Situated along the world-famous Bay of Banderas, the city’s rich mix of cultural tradition and modern comforts, as well as its bourgeoning art community seemed to be a perfect fit for her interests. In 1990, she began touring properties throughout the town, and soon fell for Casa Bur-Sus, a hillside villa with a glamorous Hollywood pedigree. Originally purchased by Sir Richard Burton for his wife Susan as a Valentine’s Day gift, the four bedroom villa embodied coastal charm and authentic Mexican style. Chatterton soon began splitting her time between San Francisco and Puerto Vallarta. A decade later, she decided to make Mexico her full-time home.
Though Chatterton had no formal design background and was not fluent in Spanish, she headed up an extensive renovation of Casa Bur-Sus creating a stunning property rich in both authentic details and modern luxuries. By the end of the project, she fell in love with the renovation process and became confident in her natural prowess as a designer, and when she was presented with the opportunity to purchase an adjacent three bedroom villa, she eagerly pounced on it. After a thorough renovation, the villa was re-named Casa San Angel and when combined with Casa Bur-Sus, the two villas formed Hacienda San Angel’s original eight room property, which opened in 2003.
As a girl, Isabel Goldsmith, daughter of flamboyant industrialist Sir James Goldsmith, was raised in hotels. She considered herself Isabel at The Plaza, and was fortunate to learn about hotels from some of the world’s best. Instead of hiding in a villa on the French Riviera, she wound up pitching a tent alone in her twenties on the wild Costa Allege up road from her legendary grandfather’s resort Las Hadas where the movie “10,” was filmed.
I spent a day with Ms. Goldsmith and could feel the resort as an extension of her history, life story in a visual and intangible way. In the sweltering heat as our guacamole wilted, she spoke a firm yet aristocratic Spanish to her staff. I felt a little unsure about the setting and her role. As we spoke, I could feel her vulnerability and love for the land in a way that was more feminine and surreal. She had the color pink splashed through out her beautiful palapas and the colonial plaza. It reminded me of my room as a little girl with canopies and pink and blue. The princess aspect was evident but also a fierce commitment to the land. She had been on the land for many years and I could feel her childlike spirit still smoldering in the Mexican heat.
Her father, Sir James Goldsmith left an eccentric shadow all over that part of the coast, but Isabel's rugged individual verve in her early twenties planted her there in a way that is quietly being ecologically influential. It is a nest for celebrities though. When I was there Annie Lennox was prancing around with a beautiful smile comfortable, relaxed and exuberant. She even built a gym for Robert Di Niro. As a woman exploring the globe for visionaries that are often men, I thought she was an inspiring person for me to reveal in the world of resort development. On her good taste, guts, instincts and love for nature, she quietly has created a hideaway that is in a way her own principality and her child.
''Just thirteen guest rooms on 1500 beautiful acres... Thank Isabel Goldsmith, Las Alamandas' visionary owner... She's left the rolling forest, estuaries and beaches in their pristine state, adding six fanciful villas... to create a compact luxury hotel enjoyed by a fortunate few.''
Another Slow Boutique Hotel owner and ran from big cities like London and New York to the soulful surf of Mexico with a very modern style keeping Mexican color and simplicity through a refined British lens offering fresh confident design and another place to chill with a surfboard, counter cultural aspirations from surf lessons to painting.
Casa de Chilicote, part of the Hotelito and very similar to Jenny Armit's own Photo: Edina van der Wyck
A blue agave plant in Armit's garden Photo: Edina van der Wyck
El Hotelito and Armit's house in the midst of banana palms and ancient mango trees Photo: Edina van der Wyck
Armit found the cream Florence Knoll sofas in her living-room at a London auction room. The rope chest of drawers is by Christian Astuguevieille Photo: Edina van der Wyck
This boutique hotel is on an island in the Caribbean owned by Sandra Perez, an artist, screenwriter and painter as well as muse to Pablo Milanes, the Cuban singer. Sandra has lined the walls with original works—hers and other Cuban artists—, personally designed the furnishings and named the rooms after inspirations: Ilusión (Illusion), Amanecer (Dawn), Sentido (Feeling)É. She is about art and beauty and nature and why wouldn’t she be. Her utopia is surrounded by blue inspiring Caribbean water.
Her Journey
One of Sandra’s aspiration as an author was to be able to write by the sea. Her dream place had also to be isolated, serene and the sea should provide ever-changing shades of blue from turquoise to deep indigo. On one memorable day, she landed in Cancun, and her attraction to the land of the Mayas was immediate and overwhelming! Little did she know then that her dream place was right there on an island where Mayas lived from time immemorial: Holbox Island… little did she know till she disembarked on this enchanting island. Nothing she ever saw was more delightful than the game nature effortlessly played with colors, the charm of the people who lived there - the barefoot fisherman with golden sparking smiles - the women weaving rainbow “hamacas” while wearing high heels stoutly implanted into the sand.
Mesmerized she thought: “ I must do something here!” Slowly a project started to germinate and to take root. Today, on the beach, facing the sea with an ever-changing shades of blue, this project has become a reality, she calls it: “A Hotel with a Human Sensitivity. Our pride is the way we have designed the environment for our guests through every details, from our art gallery filled with paintings to the beautifully designed and crafted furniture in each individual room.
We enhance the senses through emotions, poetic sensitivities, through the rainbow of “hamacas” swinging with the breeze, the rich scent of fresh coffee, the sea visible at every angle, gastronomically enchanting dinners by candle light; like colour strokes on a canvas, this place becomes magical, it becomes “The Space for your Dreams”
Holbox is part of the natural protected area of Yum Balam, that includes 154 000 hectars of protected areas, home of unique species. Non only it is here that the turtles spawn, the pink flamingos migrates, theterns soar, the white pelicans hunt, the different types of iguanas crawl, the crabs jog sideways, the dolphins surface, it is here that the wale sharks mate and gently wait for you to come play with them.
Spain's British Import
Slow Hotel Pioneer
Charlotte Scott- Trasierra
Trasierra, is nestled above in Seville Spain and was restored by a young British mom Charlotte Scott with her husband, and then just her and her kids. She moved the family from London in 1978 and has been growing and handmaking the structure in the most stylish and slowly luxurious way. Parts of the building date back to the 15th and 16th centuries.
The house stands in a 350 acre private estate, although the original property was much larger. It was a winegrowing estate up until 150 years ago when the vines were prooted and the olives planted.
It had been abandoned for 30 years when the Scotts found it in 1978 In 1979 they moved in without a telephone or electricity. Over the next ten years they restored parts of the roof and outbuildings, installed electricity and telephones and had four children, Gioconda, Jackson, George and Amber who were all raised and educated in Spain. Charlotte Scott has been working on the restoration and renovation ever since and continues to add new rooms and gardens to this day.
Italian For Beginners: The Story Of La Bandita (Marie Claire)
What happens when you leave big-city life to open a hotel in a picture-postcard village in Tuscany? You open another one.
(Ondine partnered up with her hubby, but let's face it La Bandita is glorious)
Each woman is dedicated to the land, their community and have completely reinvented their life with and without families. The adventure of their lives are an inspiration for us to visit and explore and imagine for ourselves. A slow cultivation of a dream, the land, the structures and the wishes of guests. It's an intuitive natural fit for both hotelier and guest. Hats off to these interesting worldly women!
INTERIORS FOR SLOW LIVING In The Kinfolk Home, author Nathan Williams takes readers into 35 homes around the world that reflect the values of slow living: cultivating community, simplifying our lives and reclaiming time for what matters most.
Wabi is a Japanese concept that derives from simplicity and authenticity. It values the beauty in imperfection. Elegance in natural materials, nobility without sophistication, timelessness with tradition: these are the principles that define Axel Vervoordt's personal take on the concept.
From modern garden master Stephen Orr comes a new, definitive book on herbs to finally replace the dusty and outdated classics. Here are entries on hundreds of plants that are extraordinarily useful in cooking, homeopathy, and more; dozens of recipes and DIY projects; and beautifully styled photographs so you know just what you’re growing.
Confronted with the rising tide of environmental change, a growing number of people are seeking a healthier way of living, voicing concerns about the environment and sustainable practices. However, many still remain uncertain how they can make a real positive influence. SLOW LIFE is the answer. An acronym for a more conscious way of living, SLOW (Sustainable, Local, Organic, Wholesome) and LIFE (Learning, Inspiring, Fun, Experiences) describe a uniquely holistic approach to individual health in combination with environmental health.
It's almost Halloween and one of my friends is a Wiccan, a friendly earthy witch where nature informs her and altars are a creative and essential part of her ritualistic life. This Samhain Altar is about the end of the harvest and calling in the spirit world. The veil is very thin this time of year between the living and the other side. As you can see, her altars are very well done. She's sort of like a Martha Stewart of the occult. If you have been to Mexico and like Day Of The Dead Folk art, her altars are a feast for the eyes. I tend to find high level passionate people in nature based places where I travel because I like to be in the woods or cavort with unconventional wisdom and learn new things. This witchy friend of mine is a wildly successful producer for a few major technology companies, but she has a creative side and I am inspired by her connection to ritual and the grounded precision of her real world work. It's nice to mix and match your identity with a little mysticism however you want to express it. So forget about what you think an altar is and experiment with found objects and pictures or heirlooms from and of your ancestors. Find a spot in your house that would make a great altar. This is the time of year to start playing and slow down with your mystical self as the days get shorter and the nights linger.
My Improvised Altar Celebrating A Birthday
Honoring My Ancestors
I have a good eye but I am not bound by tradition or any particular sect. I like beauty and meaning, a well placed photo, candle, flower, rock, shell, jewel, box, poem, leaf, it's all good. I like relics of holidays and creating special places in my home to mark the years, seasons, and sometimes my grief. When I lost my father, I created an altar and in the Jewish tradition lit a Kaddish candle and built a story around the light with photos and relics. Altars are a great way to express what can't be expressed in words or cards. They are symbolic representations of your personal and spiritual archeology. I had a big birthday last year and my enchanting friend encouraged me to build an altar and put up pictures of my ancestors. We had a little ceremony and I lit candles and discussed how each ancestor influenced parts of who I am. I have one living parent and knew my grandparents. I'm no altar building artist but what unfolds for me during holidays is always a creative patchwork of something eventually magical and always improvised.
I just got back from a weekend in Mammoth where clearly, the Autumn action is on in the mountain valleys near water sources and the spectacular terrain. In the Winter it's all about the mountain too because the town is a smattering of A Frames, oddball bakeries, ski shops, a ChartHouse here, a Whiskey Creek there, but what a gorgeous spot to be outside all year.
If Fiji, an island in the South Pacific could have one thing that makes it uniquely viable, that would be the Coconut. From tiny Fijian villages to resorts that cherry pick nature’s most voluptuous assets to create nirvana, the coconut, particularly in Fiji, is the through line that sets the stage for life. And the rest is a symphony of elements to create a village. One island resort in Fiji called Laucala, Island has created the ultimate combination of eco luxury and eco travel theatre. From organic farming and food to handmade spa products and locally based interior design that is, from the looks of it, intoxicatingly slow and gorgeous beyond comprehension, all is choreographed by nature and a very talented design team AAPiDesign.
Lacucala Island Resort In Fiji
Here is what they have to say about the Coconut:
In the South Pacific area the coconut palm is the tree of life, supplying food and building materials and forming the basis for medicinal and beauty products . In short, it is the mother of all South Seas cultures and the pulsating heart of Laucala . More than a quarter of this island is covered with coconut groves .
The coconuts versatile products shape every visit to Laucala, as it is used as a source of shade, an ingredient in cocktails, culinary refinement or as an ingredient for home-made wellness products . With almost a quarter of the Island covered in copra plantations, coconuts is one of the signature themes that makes the guest experience on Laucala . Being such a useful plant it is the linchpin of all our agricultural pursuits . The coconut’s uses are wide & varied including shaved coconut for the kitchen, coconut cream, coconut milk, coconut meal and flour, high grade stock feed and coconut oil .
The nuts themselves are used in the freshly picked green state for cocktails & beverages and in the matured brown state for coconut oil . Coconut oil is used as a cooking oil, a food additive, a health food supplement, an ingredient in massage oils, soaps, moisturizers, hair conditioner, cosmetics and even as an alternative to diesel oil .
The oil which is harvested at Laucala is ‘Certified Organic’ as well as ‘Cold Pressed’, ‘Hand Pressed’, ‘Virgin’ and ‘Extra Virgin’ certifications. And fresh Coconut milk and coconut water is made on daily basis . Coconut chips, milk and juices are served in the guests at this resort and on the islands. Just something to think about terms of what one tree can do. Pretty sweet.
Green Design Gets Sublime Etched Into Fantasy
The resort itself purchased and redesigned by Red Bull owner and marketing magnate Dietrich Mateschitz was about enhancing nature and making it more sensuous. Taking his global appreciation to the micro level and polishing a natural swath of paradise into this eco luxe dream in the shape of villas and cottages, an organic spa and sustainable gardens.
What a combination! The spectacular beauty of the tropical pearl of the South Seas and twelve square kilometres of space for privacy together with 25 luxurious residences and an integral philosophy that focuses on the original nature and culture of the multicultural inhabitants.
Here's a sample of women entrepreneurs and iconoclasts who made their mark running companies, designing homes or managing non-profits and yes now Hip Hotels. They harbored hotel design fantasies and also fell in love with place. As a result, women are curating travel style with their individual passion and values as part of the room fee. Below are some stylish Boutique Hotel women owned hotels by intrepid globetrotters, environmentalists and fashionistas. These women entrepreneurs opted for a flip flop life, Eco Luxe hotels and the vision to pull it off. I begin this section on women boutique hotel owners in Mexico and Spain. I will venture to South Africa, Morocco and other exotic points in my next post.
"I am a real world drop out, " Lisa Harper former CEO of Gymboree told me. "I bought a piece of land in Todo Santos while I was running Gymboree. I had it for a few years. I was living in Sonoma and knew I wanted to be in Mexico and create this dream I had of building and running a hotel. I got up and drew a picture of it. Next thing I knew, I was down there and everything I needed came to me. From the contractor to the yoga & surf instructors, even the chef from French Laundry all wound up on my team. It was a manifestation of magic on all levels." Lisa's barefoot mentality is evident in the way she styled the hotel. Hammock gardens, beach beds, straw hats and fire pits, it's a family party and a true surf and yoga spot.
Yoga and surf instructors pour drinks too!
Boutique hotel style
From Yoga & Surf Retreats to Hollywood Iconic Glamour- Women Hoteliers Slowly Take Charge. Ava Started A Mexican Trend
Remember Ava Gardner’s closed off -season hotel in Night of the Iguana when Richard Burton, the drunk priest came crawling back to her after falling off the wagon with a bus load of spinsters and a tempting Lolita needing rooms on the Pacific Coast? Now women know it's about you, your state of excellence, preserving your inner yogi, lover, chef, eco activist and interior designer and and yes, your inner Ava Gardner.
Check in to this hideout- Ava Gardner Takes Over Hotel As Needed
A Woman And Her Elegant Boutique Hotel From Hollywood Royalty
Janice Chatterton
A love nest of Richard Burton's in the town of Puerto Vallarta was purchased by Bay Area Software entrepreneur and mogul Janice Chatterton. She restored what was known as Casa Kimberley for one of Burton's wives, and turned it into the church of bon vivants and lovers where food, wine, fetes and sensuous getaways are about a the lush colonial architecture, the history of the characters that lived there and the pure charm of the villa. There is even a private church, creative cocktail parties, ubiquitous bougainvillea and slow romance from the past and present.
Hotel Design- Janice Chatterton
Her Journey
Chatterton’s hands-on approach to remodeling and decorating the Hacienda’s collection of sixteen unique suites demonstrates a painstaking attention to detail which can take decades to develop, even among the most accomplished designers. Surprisingly though, she has no formal design background, and upon making the decision to relocate to Mexico in 2000, she possessed only the most basic of conversational Spanish skills. Her remarkable success as a hotelier and designer can be attributed to an innate creativity, tenacity and penchant for perfection.
Born in Eastern Oklahoma, Chatterton spent her teenage years in central California, and started a family before settling in the Bay Area at age 30. A risk-taker from the get-go, she pioneered the creation of telephone-based trivia years ahead of the curve in the early 1980’s. Initially inspired by her interest in astrology, Chatterton began researching software that could support interactive telephone gaming and trivia after hearing about a highly successful horoscope phone line that was in operation at the time. Eventually, she created a first in phone equipment: mass-marketed interactive gaming technology. Her highly successful company drew scores of devotees through its family-friendly content, helping to firmly establish her as a successful entrepreneur operating on the vanguard of communication trends. After nearly a decade in the business, she began to taper her involvement to a minimum in order to travel the world and enjoy the fruits of her successful start-up.
Chatterton began spending time relaxing and traveling with family and friends. An initial visit to the Mexican coastal town of Ensenada helped to jump start her affinity for stays South of the border, but it wasn’t until her second trip to the country that she was able to visit Puerto Vallarta, a city that would spur an ongoing love affair with Mexico. Says Chatterton, “I visited several Mexican cities over the years, but I always kept a special place in my heart for Puerto Vallarta. It resonated with my spirit every time I came back.”
Eventually, her enduring love for Mexican culture and design persuaded her to purchase a vacation home in Puerto Vallarta. Situated along the world-famous Bay of Banderas, the city’s rich mix of cultural tradition and modern comforts, as well as its bourgeoning art community seemed to be a perfect fit for her interests. In 1990, she began touring properties throughout the town, and soon fell for Casa Bur-Sus, a hillside villa with a glamorous Hollywood pedigree. Originally purchased by Sir Richard Burton for his wife Susan as a Valentine’s Day gift, the four bedroom villa embodied coastal charm and authentic Mexican style. Chatterton soon began splitting her time between San Francisco and Puerto Vallarta. A decade later, she decided to make Mexico her full-time home.
Though Chatterton had no formal design background and was not fluent in Spanish, she headed up an extensive renovation of Casa Bur-Sus creating a stunning property rich in both authentic details and modern luxuries. By the end of the project, she fell in love with the renovation process and became confident in her natural prowess as a designer, and when she was presented with the opportunity to purchase an adjacent three bedroom villa, she eagerly pounced on it. After a thorough renovation, the villa was re-named Casa San Angel and when combined with Casa Bur-Sus, the two villas formed Hacienda San Angel’s original eight room property, which opened in 2003.
As a girl, Isabel Goldsmith, daughter of flamboyant industrialist Sir James Goldsmith, was raised in hotels. She considered herself Isabel at The Plaza, and was fortunate to learn about hotels from some of the world’s best. Instead of hiding in a villa on the French Riviera, she wound up pitching a tent alone in her twenties on the wild Costa Allege up road from her legendary grandfather’s resort Las Hadas where the movie “10,” was filmed.
I spent a day with Ms. Goldsmith and could feel the resort as an extension of her history, life story in a visual and intangible way. In the sweltering heat as our guacamole wilted, she spoke a firm yet aristocratic Spanish to her staff. I felt a little unsure about the setting and her role. As we spoke, I could feel her vulnerability and love for the land in a way that was more feminine and surreal. She had the color pink splashed through out her beautiful palapas and the colonial plaza. It reminded me of my room as a little girl with canopies and pink and blue. The princess aspect was evident but also a fierce commitment to the land. She had been on the land for many years and I could feel her childlike spirit still smoldering in the Mexican heat.
Her father, Sir James Goldsmith left an eccentric shadow all over that part of the coast, but Isabel's rugged individual verve in her early twenties planted her there in a way that is quietly being ecologically influential. It is a nest for celebrities though. When I was there Annie Lennox was prancing around with a beautiful smile comfortable, relaxed and exuberant. She even built a gym for Robert Di Niro. As a woman exploring the globe for visionaries that are often men, I thought she was an inspiring person for me to reveal in the world of resort development. On her good taste, guts, instincts and love for nature, she quietly has created a hideaway that is in a way her own principality and her child.
''Just thirteen guest rooms on 1500 beautiful acres... Thank Isabel Goldsmith, Las Alamandas' visionary owner... She's left the rolling forest, estuaries and beaches in their pristine state, adding six fanciful villas... to create a compact luxury hotel enjoyed by a fortunate few.''
Another Slow Boutique Hotel owner and ran from big cities like London and New York to the soulful surf of Mexico with a very modern style keeping Mexican color and simplicity through a refined British lens offering fresh confident design and another place to chill with a surfboard, counter cultural aspirations from surf lessons to painting.
Casa de Chilicote, part of the Hotelito and very similar to Jenny Armit's own Photo: Edina van der Wyck
A blue agave plant in Armit's garden Photo: Edina van der Wyck
El Hotelito and Armit's house in the midst of banana palms and ancient mango trees Photo: Edina van der Wyck
Armit found the cream Florence Knoll sofas in her living-room at a London auction room. The rope chest of drawers is by Christian Astuguevieille Photo: Edina van der Wyck
This boutique hotel is on an island in the Caribbean owned by Sandra Perez, an artist, screenwriter and painter as well as muse to Pablo Milanes, the Cuban singer. Sandra has lined the walls with original works—hers and other Cuban artists—, personally designed the furnishings and named the rooms after inspirations: Ilusión (Illusion), Amanecer (Dawn), Sentido (Feeling)É. She is about art and beauty and nature and why wouldn’t she be. Her utopia is surrounded by blue inspiring Caribbean water.
Her Journey
One of Sandra’s aspiration as an author was to be able to write by the sea. Her dream place had also to be isolated, serene and the sea should provide ever-changing shades of blue from turquoise to deep indigo. On one memorable day, she landed in Cancun, and her attraction to the land of the Mayas was immediate and overwhelming! Little did she know then that her dream place was right there on an island where Mayas lived from time immemorial: Holbox Island… little did she know till she disembarked on this enchanting island. Nothing she ever saw was more delightful than the game nature effortlessly played with colors, the charm of the people who lived there - the barefoot fisherman with golden sparking smiles - the women weaving rainbow “hamacas” while wearing high heels stoutly implanted into the sand.
Mesmerized she thought: “ I must do something here!” Slowly a project started to germinate and to take root. Today, on the beach, facing the sea with an ever-changing shades of blue, this project has become a reality, she calls it: “A Hotel with a Human Sensitivity. Our pride is the way we have designed the environment for our guests through every details, from our art gallery filled with paintings to the beautifully designed and crafted furniture in each individual room.
We enhance the senses through emotions, poetic sensitivities, through the rainbow of “hamacas” swinging with the breeze, the rich scent of fresh coffee, the sea visible at every angle, gastronomically enchanting dinners by candle light; like colour strokes on a canvas, this place becomes magical, it becomes “The Space for your Dreams”
Holbox is part of the natural protected area of Yum Balam, that includes 154 000 hectars of protected areas, home of unique species. Non only it is here that the turtles spawn, the pink flamingos migrates, theterns soar, the white pelicans hunt, the different types of iguanas crawl, the crabs jog sideways, the dolphins surface, it is here that the wale sharks mate and gently wait for you to come play with them.
Spain's British Import
Slow Hotel Pioneer
Charlotte Scott- Trasierra
Trasierra, is nestled above in Seville Spain and was restored by a young British mom Charlotte Scott with her husband, and then just her and her kids. She moved the family from London in 1978 and has been growing and handmaking the structure in the most stylish and slowly luxurious way. Parts of the building date back to the 15th and 16th centuries.
The house stands in a 350 acre private estate, although the original property was much larger. It was a winegrowing estate up until 150 years ago when the vines were prooted and the olives planted.
It had been abandoned for 30 years when the Scotts found it in 1978 In 1979 they moved in without a telephone or electricity. Over the next ten years they restored parts of the roof and outbuildings, installed electricity and telephones and had four children, Gioconda, Jackson, George and Amber who were all raised and educated in Spain. Charlotte Scott has been working on the restoration and renovation ever since and continues to add new rooms and gardens to this day.
Italian For Beginners: The Story Of La Bandita (Marie Claire)
What happens when you leave big-city life to open a hotel in a picture-postcard village in Tuscany? You open another one.
(Ondine partnered up with her hubby, but let's face it La Bandita is glorious)
Each woman is dedicated to the land, their community and have completely reinvented their life with and without families. The adventure of their lives are an inspiration for us to visit and explore and imagine for ourselves. A slow cultivation of a dream, the land, the structures and the wishes of guests. It's an intuitive natural fit for both hotelier and guest. Hats off to these interesting worldly women!
slow is not a speed. It's a mindset that most of us somehow lost. Let's make time to bring slow back into our life. be slow... The slow founders
On Slow Life likes that a major watch company is a featured pop up at AC Miami, a hotel company that partnered with Marriott which claims to be "a hospitality experience that gives travelers searching for a design-led hotel in a great location inspired aesthetics and the culture of the location bringing it alive to attract experiential travelers. Here's the story on the timeless fascination with slow
and why slow continues to grow into our lives as a way of being on your wrist or in a mod hotel with a deep appreciation for the present time.
Who are the guys behind slow and how did we develop the idea? The slow core team consists of 4 friends. We live spread across the world and have worked our butts off in the watch and e-commerce industries for the last 10 to 20 years ;) Ok, it has not been thaaat bad, but enough to make us feel like we’re running in a hamster wheel too much of the time and not really living our lives the way we once envisioned them….
That’s basically the origin of slow. There was a deep realization within each of us that it was time to recapture the mindset of slow… since this moment, we have tried to focus on what’s really important in life and enjoy everything we do. It’s fair to say that we developed slow for ourselves, but we soon realized that many had the same feelings. The overwhelming support for this concept strengthened our conviction that creating a brand which reflects these values is exactly the right thing at the right time.
We can’t really point out when the project actually kicked-off. The entire idea was developed over a long period of time. It was a process during which we became more and more conscious that even though there are millions of opportunities in modern society, somehow nobody has time to enjoy them. Paradoxically, the more we try to speed things up by using technology, the less time we seem to actually find - creating even more stress in our jobs and private life. Ok, now you may think we suggest we should go back to the Stone Age and start hunting mammoths… So let’s be clear! slow is not about esotericism or real slowness. slow is a decision. A decision to live your life how you really want and to focus on what really counts for you. Of course that includes a good portion of fun! We truly believe that if you change your mindset and look at the bigger picture (and not just from one side of the hamster wheel to the other), you will not only be happier but more successful in your job as well.
So, the concept was born. But why watches? Obviously there was the fact that we all worked in the watch industry for many years; where - to be honest - nothing really exciting happened for a long time and we began to feel uninspired - something that we aim to change by launching slow. More importantly even, what could illustrate the idea of evolving the way to think about time better than a watch that would allow a fundamentally different approach to reading time. A watch that would be slow. We therefore created slow Jo which displays the entire day (that, according to latest scientific research, has 24 hours) and makes you visualize time in a more natural way. Live for the moment rather than chase every minute or second. slow focuses on what really counts and therefore only uses one hand - the hour hand. This allows you to read the time precisely enough, just not every second. But do you really need that?
We founded slow with the goal to provide you an inspiring brand experience through an amazing product. Hence it was clear to us that we would only use the best quality components and manufacture the watch in Switzerland. It was also clear to us that true quality doesn’t need to come at a massive price. Therefore we diverged from the industry by ensuring our product doesn’t go through any resellers or mark ups before it gets to you. This is why we only sell online and ship the products directly from our factory to you.
Ah, one last thing. slow is supposed to be more than just a brand. We aim to be much more than just providers of a great product. We first and foremost are looking for new friends who share our ideas and are not just faceless consumers. We want to rock that boat with you and slowify the world! Join us in doing so and share your ideas with us and others. Do this on all channels – facebook, Twitter, direct email to us, and most importantly in real life with your friends! Let’s be slow together.
It’s time to evolve the way we think about time – be slow…
Here's a sample of women entrepreneurs and iconoclasts who made their mark running companies, designing homes or managing non-profits and yes now Hip Hotels. They harbored hotel design fantasies and also fell in love with place. As a result, women are curating travel style with their individual passion and values as part of the room fee. Below are some stylish Boutique Hotel women owned hotels by intrepid globetrotters, environmentalists and fashionistas. These women entrepreneurs opted for a flip flop life, Eco Luxe hotels and the vision to pull it off. I begin this section on women boutique hotel owners in Mexico and Spain. I will venture to South Africa, Morocco and other exotic points in my next post.
"I am a real world drop out, " Lisa Harper former CEO of Gymboree told me. "I bought a piece of land in Todo Santos while I was running Gymboree. I had it for a few years. I was living in Sonoma and knew I wanted to be in Mexico and create this dream I had of building and running a hotel. I got up and drew a picture of it. Next thing I knew, I was down there and everything I needed came to me. From the contractor to the yoga & surf instructors, even the chef from French Laundry all wound up on my team. It was a manifestation of magic on all levels." Lisa's barefoot mentality is evident in the way she styled the hotel. Hammock gardens, beach beds, straw hats and fire pits, it's a family party and a true surf and yoga spot.
Yoga and surf instructors pour drinks too!
Boutique hotel style
From Yoga & Surf Retreats to Hollywood Iconic Glamour- Women Hoteliers Slowly Take Charge. Ava Started A Mexican Trend
Remember Ava Gardner’s closed off -season hotel in Night of the Iguana when Richard Burton, the drunk priest came crawling back to her after falling off the wagon with a bus load of spinsters and a tempting Lolita needing rooms on the Pacific Coast? Now women know it's about you, your state of excellence, preserving your inner yogi, lover, chef, eco activist and interior designer and and yes, your inner Ava Gardner.
Check in to this hideout- Ava Gardner Takes Over Hotel As Needed
A Woman And Her Elegant Boutique Hotel From Hollywood Royalty
Janice Chatterton
A love nest of Richard Burton's in the town of Puerto Vallarta was purchased by Bay Area Software entrepreneur and mogul Janice Chatterton. She restored what was known as Casa Kimberley for one of Burton's wives, and turned it into the church of bon vivants and lovers where food, wine, fetes and sensuous getaways are about a the lush colonial architecture, the history of the characters that lived there and the pure charm of the villa. There is even a private church, creative cocktail parties, ubiquitous bougainvillea and slow romance from the past and present.
Hotel Design- Janice Chatterton
Her Journey
Chatterton’s hands-on approach to remodeling and decorating the Hacienda’s collection of sixteen unique suites demonstrates a painstaking attention to detail which can take decades to develop, even among the most accomplished designers. Surprisingly though, she has no formal design background, and upon making the decision to relocate to Mexico in 2000, she possessed only the most basic of conversational Spanish skills. Her remarkable success as a hotelier and designer can be attributed to an innate creativity, tenacity and penchant for perfection.
Born in Eastern Oklahoma, Chatterton spent her teenage years in central California, and started a family before settling in the Bay Area at age 30. A risk-taker from the get-go, she pioneered the creation of telephone-based trivia years ahead of the curve in the early 1980’s. Initially inspired by her interest in astrology, Chatterton began researching software that could support interactive telephone gaming and trivia after hearing about a highly successful horoscope phone line that was in operation at the time. Eventually, she created a first in phone equipment: mass-marketed interactive gaming technology. Her highly successful company drew scores of devotees through its family-friendly content, helping to firmly establish her as a successful entrepreneur operating on the vanguard of communication trends. After nearly a decade in the business, she began to taper her involvement to a minimum in order to travel the world and enjoy the fruits of her successful start-up.
Chatterton began spending time relaxing and traveling with family and friends. An initial visit to the Mexican coastal town of Ensenada helped to jump start her affinity for stays South of the border, but it wasn’t until her second trip to the country that she was able to visit Puerto Vallarta, a city that would spur an ongoing love affair with Mexico. Says Chatterton, “I visited several Mexican cities over the years, but I always kept a special place in my heart for Puerto Vallarta. It resonated with my spirit every time I came back.”
Eventually, her enduring love for Mexican culture and design persuaded her to purchase a vacation home in Puerto Vallarta. Situated along the world-famous Bay of Banderas, the city’s rich mix of cultural tradition and modern comforts, as well as its bourgeoning art community seemed to be a perfect fit for her interests. In 1990, she began touring properties throughout the town, and soon fell for Casa Bur-Sus, a hillside villa with a glamorous Hollywood pedigree. Originally purchased by Sir Richard Burton for his wife Susan as a Valentine’s Day gift, the four bedroom villa embodied coastal charm and authentic Mexican style. Chatterton soon began splitting her time between San Francisco and Puerto Vallarta. A decade later, she decided to make Mexico her full-time home.
Though Chatterton had no formal design background and was not fluent in Spanish, she headed up an extensive renovation of Casa Bur-Sus creating a stunning property rich in both authentic details and modern luxuries. By the end of the project, she fell in love with the renovation process and became confident in her natural prowess as a designer, and when she was presented with the opportunity to purchase an adjacent three bedroom villa, she eagerly pounced on it. After a thorough renovation, the villa was re-named Casa San Angel and when combined with Casa Bur-Sus, the two villas formed Hacienda San Angel’s original eight room property, which opened in 2003.
As a girl, Isabel Goldsmith, daughter of flamboyant industrialist Sir James Goldsmith, was raised in hotels. She considered herself Isabel at The Plaza, and was fortunate to learn about hotels from some of the world’s best. Instead of hiding in a villa on the French Riviera, she wound up pitching a tent alone in her twenties on the wild Costa Allege up road from her legendary grandfather’s resort Las Hadas where the movie “10,” was filmed.
I spent a day with Ms. Goldsmith and could feel the resort as an extension of her history, life story in a visual and intangible way. In the sweltering heat as our guacamole wilted, she spoke a firm yet aristocratic Spanish to her staff. I felt a little unsure about the setting and her role. As we spoke, I could feel her vulnerability and love for the land in a way that was more feminine and surreal. She had the color pink splashed through out her beautiful palapas and the colonial plaza. It reminded me of my room as a little girl with canopies and pink and blue. The princess aspect was evident but also a fierce commitment to the land. She had been on the land for many years and I could feel her childlike spirit still smoldering in the Mexican heat.
Her father, Sir James Goldsmith left an eccentric shadow all over that part of the coast, but Isabel's rugged individual verve in her early twenties planted her there in a way that is quietly being ecologically influential. It is a nest for celebrities though. When I was there Annie Lennox was prancing around with a beautiful smile comfortable, relaxed and exuberant. She even built a gym for Robert Di Niro. As a woman exploring the globe for visionaries that are often men, I thought she was an inspiring person for me to reveal in the world of resort development. On her good taste, guts, instincts and love for nature, she quietly has created a hideaway that is in a way her own principality and her child.
''Just thirteen guest rooms on 1500 beautiful acres... Thank Isabel Goldsmith, Las Alamandas' visionary owner... She's left the rolling forest, estuaries and beaches in their pristine state, adding six fanciful villas... to create a compact luxury hotel enjoyed by a fortunate few.''
Another Slow Boutique Hotel owner and ran from big cities like London and New York to the soulful surf of Mexico with a very modern style keeping Mexican color and simplicity through a refined British lens offering fresh confident design and another place to chill with a surfboard, counter cultural aspirations from surf lessons to painting.
Casa de Chilicote, part of the Hotelito and very similar to Jenny Armit's own Photo: Edina van der Wyck
A blue agave plant in Armit's garden Photo: Edina van der Wyck
El Hotelito and Armit's house in the midst of banana palms and ancient mango trees Photo: Edina van der Wyck
Armit found the cream Florence Knoll sofas in her living-room at a London auction room. The rope chest of drawers is by Christian Astuguevieille Photo: Edina van der Wyck
This boutique hotel is on an island in the Caribbean owned by Sandra Perez, an artist, screenwriter and painter as well as muse to Pablo Milanes, the Cuban singer. Sandra has lined the walls with original works—hers and other Cuban artists—, personally designed the furnishings and named the rooms after inspirations: Ilusión (Illusion), Amanecer (Dawn), Sentido (Feeling)É. She is about art and beauty and nature and why wouldn’t she be. Her utopia is surrounded by blue inspiring Caribbean water.
Her Journey
One of Sandra’s aspiration as an author was to be able to write by the sea. Her dream place had also to be isolated, serene and the sea should provide ever-changing shades of blue from turquoise to deep indigo. On one memorable day, she landed in Cancun, and her attraction to the land of the Mayas was immediate and overwhelming! Little did she know then that her dream place was right there on an island where Mayas lived from time immemorial: Holbox Island… little did she know till she disembarked on this enchanting island. Nothing she ever saw was more delightful than the game nature effortlessly played with colors, the charm of the people who lived there - the barefoot fisherman with golden sparking smiles - the women weaving rainbow “hamacas” while wearing high heels stoutly implanted into the sand.
Mesmerized she thought: “ I must do something here!” Slowly a project started to germinate and to take root. Today, on the beach, facing the sea with an ever-changing shades of blue, this project has become a reality, she calls it: “A Hotel with a Human Sensitivity. Our pride is the way we have designed the environment for our guests through every details, from our art gallery filled with paintings to the beautifully designed and crafted furniture in each individual room.
We enhance the senses through emotions, poetic sensitivities, through the rainbow of “hamacas” swinging with the breeze, the rich scent of fresh coffee, the sea visible at every angle, gastronomically enchanting dinners by candle light; like colour strokes on a canvas, this place becomes magical, it becomes “The Space for your Dreams”
Holbox is part of the natural protected area of Yum Balam, that includes 154 000 hectars of protected areas, home of unique species. Non only it is here that the turtles spawn, the pink flamingos migrates, theterns soar, the white pelicans hunt, the different types of iguanas crawl, the crabs jog sideways, the dolphins surface, it is here that the wale sharks mate and gently wait for you to come play with them.
Spain's British Import
Slow Hotel Pioneer
Charlotte Scott- Trasierra
Trasierra, is nestled above in Seville Spain and was restored by a young British mom Charlotte Scott with her husband, and then just her and her kids. She moved the family from London in 1978 and has been growing and handmaking the structure in the most stylish and slowly luxurious way. Parts of the building date back to the 15th and 16th centuries.
The house stands in a 350 acre private estate, although the original property was much larger. It was a winegrowing estate up until 150 years ago when the vines were prooted and the olives planted.
It had been abandoned for 30 years when the Scotts found it in 1978 In 1979 they moved in without a telephone or electricity. Over the next ten years they restored parts of the roof and outbuildings, installed electricity and telephones and had four children, Gioconda, Jackson, George and Amber who were all raised and educated in Spain. Charlotte Scott has been working on the restoration and renovation ever since and continues to add new rooms and gardens to this day.
Italian For Beginners: The Story Of La Bandita (Marie Claire)
What happens when you leave big-city life to open a hotel in a picture-postcard village in Tuscany? You open another one.
(Ondine partnered up with her hubby, but let's face it La Bandita is glorious)
Each woman is dedicated to the land, their community and have completely reinvented their life with and without families. The adventure of their lives are an inspiration for us to visit and explore and imagine for ourselves. A slow cultivation of a dream, the land, the structures and the wishes of guests. It's an intuitive natural fit for both hotelier and guest. Hats off to these interesting worldly women!
Utah in all of its hidden splendor hatches another power center of creativity and alpine inspiration, Summit Powder Mountain. Think Wisdom 2.0 Meets Alta& Sundance with a little early Aspen and Tech Crunch on the side. The place is starting to make some tracks.
A mindshare mountain for the Uber Alpine Communal Capitalist
See how inclusive altruism blooms as millennials are launching ski towns and this alpine utopia is a poster child for how dreams become things like ski enlightened ski resorts.
Here is what they have to say about themselves:
Summit is building a mountain town around the spirit of innovation in the heart of Utah's Wasatch Mountains. Summit Powder Mountain aims to rethink the great American mountain town around a community focused on innovation, entrepreneurship, arts, and altruism. Tucked on the southern side of Powder Mountain, in the town of Eden, Utah, it’s a new kind of neighborhood, where friends, family, and the change makers of today and tomorrow gather in an environment created to catalyze personal and collective growth.
I consider this idea the anti Yellowstone Club - A former nest of greed, luxury and exclusivity that imploded in the mid 200's and now is a high end private ski resort with a wicked past.
After writing about and going to the Yellowstone Club in Big Sky Montana and visiting, the experience felt more exclusive if you weren't part of their inner circle. Summit? Ok, get me a guitar a maker shack, some telemark skis, a Bernese Mountain Dog, a Jack Russell, a frisbee, a bunch of brainiacs, lots of good California wine, and great Mexican Tequila. Oh and let's not forget the pine cone to table food, the owl's nest to bed handmade luxury and Dwell Magazine design ethos. Most importantly, there better be a climate that behaves. Good snow, environmental stewardship, manners, self expression, diversity and peace and love. And what about a few people with gray hair, the sages and the proven warriors in this "space.?" Bring it on.
Excerpt from New York Times Profile by Andy Isaacson
“What Tesla did to cars,” Elliott Bisnow, a Powder Mountain owner, explained, wide-eyed, to the group visiting in January, “we’re going to do with towns!”
Other than being idealistic and unabashedly earnest, Powder’s young owners are also savvy connectors. In 2008, Mr. Bisnow, then 23 and a founder of a successful real estate industry e-newsletter company (Bisnow Media), gathered 19 entrepreneurs at the Alta Mountain ski area in Utah. A bonding ski trip turned into another company called Summit Series, which has hosted annual conferences in Playa del Carmen, Mexico, and Washington. In April 2011, Summit chartered a cruise ship around the Bahamas for 1,500 attendees, while also raising nearly $1 million with the Nature Conservancy to support a marine protected area there. The next winter, the company took over much of the Squaw Valley resort in California for a weekend.
About Summit
Summit's mission is to build community, catalyze entrepreneurship, address global issues, and support artistic achievement, in an effort to make our world a more joyful place.
On Slow Life has an affinity for the mountain resort. Highlights of the high life will always have a home here. See other articles on winter wonderlands
Most people don’t want to be labeled or categorized, but let’s face it, there seems to be two kinds of travelers. There is the tourist – the person that arrives in a new destination with the checklist of must-see attractions, and more often than not, stays at franchise hotels with predictable features no matter where they go. The tourist doesn’t get too far off the beaten path without a guidebook or a guide. What’s not to love about the salt spray in your face as you make your way to Alcatraz, or the feeling of national pride you feel when visiting the Statue of Liberty, and the sense of romance that comes gazing at Paris from the Eifel Tower. Iconic landmarks will always be a part of travel and checking the boxes has value.
At the other end of the spectrum is the New Traveler – the person that arrives in a new destination in search of adventure, an authentic experience. The New Traveler develops a relationship with the destination, the culture, and enthusiastically indulges the senses with local food, music, art, and new -found friendships. The New Traveler pays attention to the details from the choreographed to the magic moments that happen spontaneously. Destinations that honor simplicity, beauty, authenticity, spirit of place have staying power with the New Traveler. Intuition and nuance are their guiding principles when seeking out their next journey, be it a city, a safari, a resort or a hotel.
The New Traveler asks what can I do to help? They are interested in the dialogue, not the monologue so prevalent in the tourist’s experience, The New Traveler is a solution seeker and a student of life who wants to contribute to the highest human potential whether it is health care, clean drinking water, education, human rights, or conservation. They want to know what is going on where they visit and contribute to solutions with their resources in whatever form seems meaningful.
The New Traveler is incredibly loyal, spreading the gospel of their experience with friends and family. This is the New Traveler’s currency - sharing stories of their adventures and being a self-proclaimed expert on the authentic and undiscovered.
Immersion and experience are the words of the time, and are timeless for travelers versus tourists. Collecting data and taking selfies, running through destinations and time zones for bragging rights is exhausting and hollow. Time is precious, how we spend it imprints the New Traveler more then ever and the creative bar equates to authenticity and story, the engaging tale of the experience and how it feels. A great Facebook post can inspire, Instagram photos are gorgeous postcards of one person’s worldview. These are key prompts but not the whole story. Not even close.
Go far, go visit and live life.
New Agency is a collective of experienced strategists, conservationists, creatives, world travelers, experiential marketing experts, storytellers, visual designers, researchers, event planners, and visionaries. We are committed to a better world and we know that solving today’s environmental and social challenges is the biggest opportunity of our generation. Today’s challenges require new strategies, solutions, and ways of working together to create positive change. Our genius is in getting to the soul of each project and connecting with your audience in a meaningful and lasting way. Our focus is tourism, hospitality & conservation. newagency.ca
A Pioneer Who Unpaved the Way for The Largest Proposed Wildlife Corridor in the US
Passages are metaphorical and literal. Yesterday marked the anniversary of my father's passing and every year I look back at aspects of his legacy. One of his proudest was donating land that he owned for many years to the Santa Monica Land Conservancy for a wildlife corridor. A builder and a street smart wheeler dealer found his true grit by making way for bobcats, mountain lions and deer to roam freely on his property from one mountain range to the other by donating his land. After holding on for 25 years, he let it go.
In 2001, he donated 107 acres that bridge the Santa Monica and Santa Susana Mountains just north of Los Angeles off of the 101 near Liberty Canyon. He was not a tree hugger, he was a land developer and built homes, apartment buildings and shopping centers. He had a turbulent relationship with that land from the day he bought it. His intention was to develop custom homes and secure a financial legacy for himself and his family. Zoning and an evolving list of environmental obstacles kept him in the game, yet always at odds with the city trying to find ways to get his way. Courting offers, fighting city officals, making threats to use it for landfill, listing it and just sitting on it, over time, a 25- year effort, it became clear the land hosted a corridor that had everything to do with the migration of the animals. When he came to his children to help weigh his decision, we all decided the animals would get the land. It was the right thing to do. Now EcoWatch has covered this area World’s Largest Wildlife Corridor to Be Built in California
'I feel like I am grandpa to many many species of animals.'
Al Abrams
That issue has become more and more urgent in the LA basin as mountain lions and bobcats are trapped within small habitats surrounded by freeways and human barriers. The animals are unable to move freely and breed out of their own families and are beginning to capture the collective imagination because of their ferocity and accessibility and possible extinction.
Excerpt from Earth Island Institute and EcoWatch
Trapped Mountain Lions Plot Daring Escape From LA BY JAMES WILLIAM GIBSON – SEPTEMBER 17, 2015
Network of wildlife corridors planned to ease big cats’ genetic bottleneck
Earlier this month an obscure Los Angeles area regional public lands agency — the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority — announced the first stages of a five-year plan to build one of the largest wildlife corridors in the world. The goal is to create a natural looking bridge that will allow a small cougar population in the Santa Monica Mountain National Recreation Area the chance to escape north into much larger public lands, while at the same time allowing northern mountain lions the chance to move south and help out the badly inbred and lethally infighting Santa Monica cougars.
Although a young female from the Santa Monica Mountains, P33, did successfully cross Highway 101 in March this year, her escape north is a rare event.
The proposed bridge will leap over Highway 101, an eight-lane, east-west freeway in LA’s northern suburbs that sees 175,000 car trips a day. The bridge will be built at Liberty Canyon in the suburb of Agoura and when completed will be 200 feet-long and 165 feet-wide. It will be landscaped to blend in with the brushy hills and sound walls along the edge of the bridge will “mitigate traffic noise and block light in order to make the crossing more conducive to wildlife,” says the project study report. The bridge will extend beyond the 101, reaching over an access road south of the highway, necessitating the construction of a tunnel. Estimated cost of the entire project: about $57 million.
Despite the report’s dull bureaucratic language—mountain lion sex is blandly described as “the exchange of genetic material”—at its heart the proposed Liberty Canyon wildlife corridor represents an astonishing effort to reverse decades of suburban sprawl and fragmentation of the region’s surviving open spaces.
The campaign’s iconic poster boy is the famous “Hollywood lion,” also known by its wildlife ID number, “P22.” In 2012, P22 crossed two major freeways and migrated roughly 40 miles from the Santa Monica Mountains along the coast to Los Angeles’s 4300-acre Griffith Park on the city’s eastside. There he took up residence, feeding on the park’s mule deer and soon became a national celebrity of sorts.
P22, the only young male from the Santa Mountain Mountains to escape death, is not considered an example of successful dispersal because he will never breed. Photo credit: Crystal / Flickr Beth Pratt was one of P22’s earliest and most ardent fans. Pratt, the California executive director of the National Wildlife Federation, was fascinated by the lion’s story and contacted wildlife biologists studying the Santa Monica Mountains cougars. One of those biologists was Dr. Seth Riley, who from 2002 to 2012 led a National Park Service team that trapped some 42 cougars: 26 from the Santa Monica Mountains, five from the Santa Susana Mountains north of 101 and the rest from throughout the region. All of the cougars were fitted with GPS transmitting collars. The cougars trapped north of 101 mostly survived. But the 12 young males from the Santa Monica Mountains did not make it. They tried to disperse, going right up to the edges of the region’s freeways. Four who tried to cross died in the effort. Five who turned back were attacked and killed by older male lions. One was shot by police; one died from unknown causes.
The only young male from the Santa Mountain Mountains to escape death was P22—and he is not considered an example of successful dispersal because he will never breed. “The [Santa Monica Mountains] are a population sink,” the park service’s Riley concludes. “The Santa Monica Mountain cougar population is not going to survive in the long run. For mountain lions, there is only room for ten-ish adults. That’s not enough genetically or even demographically. One male hit by a car and one killed by rodenticide and poof, you’re done.”
Beth Pratt became taken with P22 as an icon for all the trapped lions. “I’m a shameless marketer,” she admits. “I saw how P22 could be the absolute poster child. People just love him. Once people get focused on his specific story—the lonely bachelor—you can talk about mountain lions in general.
The intense scientific monitoring and the sophisticated engineering behind the fences, underpasses and bridges is but the physical embodiment of an important cultural change. In Southern California, wild dreams are being acted out in the effort to boost the cougar’s chances of survival. The conservation efforts symbolize that if we let the mountain lions die on the freeways and in their confined territories, then we will also lose part of ourselves.
Regarding my dad's story, in the end he was kind of a lonely bachelor like the lion.
The day he spoke in front of city and government officials and Santa Monica Land Conservancy delegates and media, I waited for him to make a wise crack or lose his composure. But it didn't happen. He was remarkable and poised. His message was about California and the land and the wildlife he wanted to help protect. His love of California was illustrated by his actions and making peace with the fact we would not see a secure future in that real estate development but in keeping the land open space.
It takes all kinds to inspire and participate in change, even the most unlikely of candidates. That land did become a part of him. When he no longer owned it, he seemed untethered. The transfer was a source of philosophical comfort but it made him seem a little lost. I want to honor people who make choices that can be painful like losing a piece of your identity for the greater good. I know my father suffered from the dashed dreams of not building his empire on that land when he was young enough to oversee it. By the time he transferred the land, his ability to make the leap in his mind that it wasn't his took some doing. I thank him and I am hoping and thinking the animals thank him too.
Where Meaning + Capital Markets Define The New Investor i(x) Investments Might Be In The Sweet Spot To Lead The Way
Impact Investors are surfing, climbing and skiing the planet, connecting the world via technology and personal or philanthropic global adventures and experiential connecting. Everything they do from work to choosing responsibly made clothes or how to invest in their world, is a direct extension of who they are or aspire to be.
A look at Trevor Neilson, Founding Partner from Los Angeles
Trevor Neilson & Howard Warren Buffett, the new faces of natural capitalism, social activism and financial credibility are prioritizing global health: Water, Food, Education, Health, Gender Issues, from the inside out by doing the math and inspiring new investors with creativity, meaning and solutions.
What is rising up and creating a financial platform for companies to have the incentives and the capital to invest and make sustainable returns on solving the world’s problems? Compound impact. Compound impact is the exponential, scaled growth of solutions to global problems, which can happen only when money is invested in a sustained and sustainable way and that = game changer. Trevor Neilson, Howard Warren Buffet, of i(x)Investments, a permanently capitalized holding company for investors that want to create long-term economic growth in combination with social impact are creating a new formula. They are cracking the code where altruism meets the capital markets enabling investors to deliver solutions and make meaningful investments from their abundance and early success.
“Impact investing should not be seen as a niche -- it should be seen as the norm. We need to assume that all investments can have a positive social impact -- and move away from those that don't.”Trevor Neilson Huffington Post
What does impact investing mean? Impact investments are investments made into companies, organizations, and funds with the intention to generate social and environmental impact alongside a financial return. Neilson and Buffett found each other on their quest to help solve the world’s problems via the power of capitalism and creative fund structures attracting scientists, experts and thought leaders and a breed of young investors armed with tech assets and socially impactful ambition. They built a team of like minded partners including J.Todd Morley and Par Lindstrom and created I(x) Investments. To learn more go to their site I(x) Investments .
There is a crisis of meaning and spending that doesn’t fulfill our deeper need to make the world better and that is being echoed by a lot of thought leaders like Neilson in relation to how to evolve and solve critical problems. New investors in different pockets of the country, particularly the Silicon Valley, are conscious of their influence via their capital.“The vast majority of the “things” tech produces does not create meaningful social impact,” Neilson points out. See article What’s Eating Silicon Valley regarding themes that young highly compensated new investors are ruminating on regarding purpose, liquidity and path to helping solve global and local issues.
I(x) investments invest in early-stage and undervalued companies that are working on issues such as clean energy, sustainable agriculture and water scarcity. They are doing things differently and partner with issue experts around the world, which allows i(x) to measure the social impact of their investors with more rigor than any other impact investing firm.
Issue experts in human need and social change advise i(x) and build custom measurement systems into each portfolio along with systems for monitoring and evaluating rates of change. This effort will be led by co-founder Howard W. Buffett and will be based on his “social value investing” framework. A sample of a few areas of interest @ i(x) include solutions from harnessing humidity to create water or feed livestock protein in the form of crickets vs. plundering the earth’s natural resources to feed polluters and a host of other solution based opportunities.
The scientists and the experts in their fields and in the field inspire Neilson more than other players in impact investing. “We help give them momentum,” he states. Momentum and credibility resonate with the new investor looking to contribute and sustain profitability. Impact investing is now in our collective vernacular with roots in philanthropic philosophy, but it’s really conscious investing ramped up for formerly distracted types, hyper productive generators and deeply conscious leaders who want to contribute to solutions on a global scale. They are surfing, climbing and skiing the planet, connecting the world via technology and personal and global adventures. Everything they do from work, the clothes they wear and the investments made are an extension of who they are or aspire to be. There is a new breed of activist entrepreneur looking for the right vehicles. Urgency mixed with stillness and practicing mindfulness, choosing investments with a more honed intuition and wisely learning from the collective is power. There is clear evidence we are living on a very fragile planet and capitalism can solve our biggest problems. Neilson and his partners are keenly aware of all of this and doing something different.
It’s In Their DNA- Who Are These Guys?
Trevor Neilson helped define new philanthropy in the early days of tech philanthropy. He was instrumental in guiding Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation as the young tech billionaire was finding his voice on the world stage of giving. A pioneer in working with young technology assets and helping philanthropy morph into something relevant to the culture, Neilson helped shepherd new tech money and it’s impact revealing a new model. He began this journey in the late 90’s.
Neilson’s core values are the hub of the wheel by staying true to his conscience and doing the math with some brilliant minds and partners. He looks inside to thread the themes of the times that we are all in this together, and as the culture becomes more conscious, so too are the investments.
Neilson’s delivery is sincere and clear from his view of the world, a paired down stylish zen like office with the Pacific as the back drop both filled with beauty and challenges. “Profit in this new model will expose dinosaurs, such as fossil fuels ( which are not sustainable), and they will go extinct. More money will be generated by doing good.” A white board with company pitches, formulas, ideas and roadmaps ignite ideas and solutions from this satellite perch on the Pacific just one of the company’s locations on the planet riding the next wave of capitalism and shaping the board with a long view and a profitable lens.
Long term investing in conservation is the approach to sustainable tourism while protecting, engaging, inspiring and learning as climate changes, people evolve, economies ebb and flow and life continues.
Long term investing & nurturing in the future of place and environment = a realistic approach by taking the long view
Leaders with a specific vision and talent for stimulating investment, philanthropy, social impact and profit are creating another layer of tourism that engages the traveler beyond their own private journey. Tourism is a holistic venture where collaboration, capital, innovation, community, patience and heritage will support the benefits that only travel can provide. Capital and vision will help preserve some of the most sensitive and breathtaking corners of the planet and this post highlights a few visionaries making an impact on tourism from New Mexico to South Africa. This post has a few snapshots of Luke Bailes, CEO Singita, Sonu Shavdasini, CEO & Chairman Soneva Group, Louis Bacon, Moore Capital Management, Ted Turner, Turner Enterprises and Richard Branson have taken corners of the globe under their wing to share, preserve and sustain through passion, capital and taking the long view. I will be taking my first trip to Africa where I will learn about other visionaries on a smaller scale in South Africa and Botswana and look forward to bringing their legacies, journeys, experiences into my own narrative.
The Take Away Tourism + Saving The World Through investing in place, people, time and experience
= A Long Term Strategy with a lot of vision
South Africa - Luke Bailes CEO Singita
As the world’s human population continues its exponential growth, the loss of pristine wilderness is taking place at an ever-accelerating rate, to counteract this Singita is making a profound difference in many parts of Africa.
Orchestrating an interdependent relationship between communities, wildlife and tourism that ensures true sustainability, Singita is blazing a trail which is seldom achieved on this scale anywhere else on the continent.
Courtesy of Blue Marble - UK
Here, Luke shares his thoughts on falling in love with Africa, the benefits of a long-term plan and helpful billionaires...
Q: What was the genesis for Singita and what propelled you to commit to such an ambitious concept?
In the early days there were fantastic wildlife experiences on offer but very few complimentary hospitality experiences. Matching the two was our goal when we started Singita. We quickly realised over the years, that wildlife and pristine wilderness was under threat due to increased population growth and so over time the emphasis has completely shifted to preserving at-risk areas and working in partnership with local communities.
Singita is unusual in that you consider a very long term horizon when setting strategy and objectives. Can you explain the approach behind your "100 year plan”?
"One of our concerns is that businesses have become so driven by greed and short-term profit that it impacts on strategy and decision-making, which ultimately impacts on the health of the business. Our approach is totally opposite – we don’t look at the short-term. Our primary objective is to preserve and protect large tracts of land in Africa for future generations and everything we do supports that. Ironically when you do things properly and well, profits take care of themselves and this gives us the wherewithal to do what we do.
Louis Bacon is a conservation philanthropist who has spent more than two decades supporting efforts to protect natural resources in the United States and abroad. Louis Bacon is a conservation philanthropist who has spent more than two decades supporting efforts to protect natural resources in the United States and abroad.
Bacon is the Founder and Chairman of The Moore Charitable Foundation, Inc. (“MCF”) and its affiliate foundations across North America, spanning southern Colorado, northern New Mexico, eastern North Carolina, The Bahamas, Panama and Long Island, New York. Mr. Bacon founded The Moore Charitable Foundation in 1992. The Foundation works with conservation experts and leaders and has provided significant funding to more than 200 local, national and international environmental organizations.
In 2012, he gave 90,000 acres to the federal government as a conservation easement, and created the Trinchera Blanca Foundation to permanently protect 167,000 of the 171,400 acres of his Trinchera Blanca Ranch, expanding the Sangre de Cristo Conservation Area bordering the San Luis Valley in Colorado, and placed his 20,000 acre Tercio Ranch in a conservation easement as well. Prior to that, he’d also made significant contributions to conservation projects in his childhood home of North Carolina, on Long Island, New York, and in the Bahamas.
Taos Ski Valley - Bacon Regenerates a Slow Tough Mountain and delicately handles the locals and the essence of the place.
Now, it appears as though Bacon has turned his eyes toward Taos, New Mexico. Having owned property there since 1996, Bacon had worked with the previous owners of the Taos Ski Valley, the Blake Family, to develop a master plan for renovating the aging ski resort that was ultimately approved by the forest service in 2012. The family, which had been seeing tourism decline, had wanted to make improvements for a long time, but could not afford them without risking the ability to pay their employees.
It was Bacon’s conservation ethic, as well as his willingness to work with the family, that Led the Blakes to offer to sell him the property. "We believe Louis is the right person to ensure a viable future for the ski valley and that his ownership will be beneficial to our employees, Taos' residents and guests," said Mickey Blake in a statement. "I'm in mourning a little bit but I realize this is really a good thing for the ski area," said Adriana Blake.
Bacon is dedicated to “advancing the Blake family vision and legacy of Taos Ski Valley by continuing to provide an unmatched skiing experience while serving as an economic driver for northern New Mexico,” according to his spokesman Peter Talty. And his commitment to conservation also has environmental protection groups in New Mexico looking to him to help further local conservation efforts. If history is any indicator, these groups may not have to wait long—his deal with the federal government for conservation easements in Colorado took just two years from genesis to completion.
" Our theory is that a new luxury is emerging based on what is now missing in everyday life: nature, sustainability and good health. This is why our resorts win so many awards and have been so successful, as we try to inspire a lifetime of rare experiences."
Sonu Shivdasani is one of the founders of The Soneva Foundation and is Chairman and CEO of Soneva Resorts & Residences and founded Six Senses Resorts & Spas. For nearly 20 years Sonu and his wife, Eva, have created the template for sustainable tourism, coining the concepts of SLOW LIFE and intelligent luxury which recognises the ability for luxury holiday making and care for the environment to co-exist with perfect ease.
Sonu Shivdasani: We question and challenge what luxury is for the wealthy today. In the past, the wealthy were rural landed gentry and the language of luxury was that which was rare for them: dressing up, four piece bands, gold, crystal chandeliers… because that offered them a change from their daily life which was about nature and space.
It’s estimated that the hospitality industry benefits the richest 20-30% of the planet, at the expense of the poorest 70-80%. We as an industry consume more than our fair share of resources. However, resorts and hotels are often central to a community, so we have the ability to raise awareness and change consciousness. We are in a position to encourage, utilise, and even mobilise our wealthy and collectively powerful patrons.
What motivates Soneva's sustainability efforts, which focus not just on reducing your impacts, but on also ensuring you make a positive contribution to society and to environmental restoration?
Hoteliers must continue to work together to find ways to cause less “harm” and do more “good”. Companies must become ‘solutions’ rather than ‘problems’. I believe that in all our businesses we can make small changes to our business model, which has no negative impacts on our profitability or our guests’ perception of our products.Today it is the other way around: the wealthy live in their air-conditioned urban boxes, get around in their German car boxes, eat in designer restaurants with signature imported foods cooked by celebrity chefs, etc. Those things are no longer rare. They have become common place for the wealthy, global citizen.
The foundation has so far raised almost US$ 6 million from the environmental levy, which is fantastic considering we are a small group of resorts. What is noteworthy is that this amount of capital for good causes has not been raised by blind donations but as a result of tweaking our business model.
We have used this money to fund a forest restoration programme in northern Thailand where we have planted around half a million trees to mitigate 255,000 tonnes of CO2. The money has also funded a windmill in South India. The foundation is also using the money we raise to provide heavily subsidised cooking stoves in Myanmar and Darfur benefiting around 180,000 people to date. You can see that with the most incremental of changes, a company can do an extraordinary amount of good without negatively affecting business aims.
We see that our guests respond very well to our sustainable initiatives. In terms of communicating about sustainability, we have taken the approach that we minimize information on what you cannot do and focus on what positive steps we are doing. It is important to focus on the opportunities sustainability gives and that often the most luxurious experience is the most sustainable. Our guests love to visit our vegetable garden and to see that the food they eat comes straight from the ground the same day. The Fresh in the Garden restaurant, which is the only restaurant at Soneva Fushi not near the beach, is the favourite for many of our guests.
Having said that, we also show guests who are interested the less glamorous sides, but important practices we do at our Eco Centro ‘Waste-to-Wealth’ facility. What we find is that they truly appreciate our efforts and are impressed that through innovative thinking we are able to see value and turn waste into an asset rather than a liability. That is exactly what sustainability is about – seeing the opportunities rather than focusing on the restrictions.
Ted Turner - Media Mogul, Environmentalist, Eco Tour Expeditions, Philanthropist
Turner’s appreciation for our beautiful Earth and its creatures runs deep, compelling him to work tirelessly to protect and conserve our environment, as well as its animal and plant species. It is through his numerous foundations, including the United Nations Foundation, Turner Foundation, Nuclear Threat Initiative and Turner Endangered Species Fund, that Turner has advanced his conservation and philanthropic efforts. Among Turner’s various and considerable contributions, including his historic $1 billion gift to the United Nations, he has given over $374 million to programs for improving air and water quality, developing a sustainable energy future to protect our climate, safeguarding environmental health and protecting wildlife and habitats to maintain biodiversity.
Turner wishes to share his complete love of nature, wildlife and discovery in order to help all generations develop a keen appreciation for and awareness of what our Earth has to offer and just as importantly, a shared responsibility for the well-being of our environment. After much thoughtful consideration, Turner has established a way in which to achieve this through the launch of Ted Turner Expeditions
“WE HAVE AN OBLIGATION AND A PRIVILEGE TO PRESERVE AND MAINTAIN OUR PLANET AND THE SPECIES WE SHARE THE PLANET WITH.” TED TURNER
Richard Branson The B Team |Virgin Group - Morocco - South Africa - Necker Island
Richard Branson - Necker Island B Team and Virgin Group
Agreement at summit hosted by Sir Richard Branson will see islands switch from expensive diesel to renewables
Sir Richard Branson is continuing his push for sustainable energy in the Caribbean, and the Caribbean resident is putting his money where his mouth is.
Branson has been on a drive to make his private Necker Island in the British Virgin Islands more green, following his regional call for sustainable energy development.
Branson has been perhaps the region’s most high-profile advocate for green energy, working with the Carbon War Room and the Rocky Mountain Institute to help regional stakeholders identify the region’s optimal energy future.
Last year, he convened a high-level regional conference on Necker that launched the “Ten Island Challenge,” which called for massive investment in green energy development in signatory countries, which ranged from Aruba to Colombia.
In 2004, Richard established Virgin Unite, his non-profit foundation. It mobilises the talent and resources from across the Virgin Group and beyond, to tackle tough social and environmental problems in an entrepreneurial way. It is built on the belief that, the only way we can address the scale of the challenges facing the world today is by revolutionising the way businesses and the social sector work together – driving business as a force for good.
Richard has been working closely with Virgin Unite to bring together the right partners to help create new global leadership models to address conflict, climate change and disease.
Home as Hotel, Office and Sanctuary Books That Inspired Home Journeys
Great Mediterranean Escapes, Living in Morocco
Play with your yard....
Los Angeles House - Spanish & Moroccan & French Influences
It is almost summer and I get a nostalgic tug to be somewhere on the other side of the world. Right about now my mind wanders to a different era in my life. Summer.
Vacations of the past, and the way I am hard wired to plan and wander influence the season. I am home and creating a place from books and images, countries visited and ideas. I usually move very fast to get somewhere slow and more interesting than my own backyard. Although it may be true that diving in Fiji for instance or lingering on a limestone cliff in Turkey or sitting at an Italian café on the beach sounds pretty good, at least in my dreams, there is something simple and comforting about sticking around for a quiet hot August.
Dinner In The Courtyard | Los Angeles or Provence?
No flying, road tripping, fleeing or reorganizing this week.I pulled out my lawn to save water, will put DG on the ground, continue to line dry, and slowly let summer in.
In the hopes of importing a little Mediterranean into my abode, I look at style and design books from all over the world. I consider the arid beauty of Mexico or the Mediterranean as I get ideas on how to live at home with style and global reminders. Here's my breakfast room after looking at Greece Style
My Breakfast Room
One way to enjoy a little armchair travel and gear up for later adventures is the illustrious coffee table book. Taschen& Rizzoli have some amazing decor and travel images that help.
Books That Trigger Your Own Hotel Home & Work Life
To be happy at home is the ultimate result of all ambition
Samuel Johnson
Do you know a home that is like a little hotel? It can be a room in a city apartment, a house, a yard or a window. Maybe yours? Post your pictures and share your inspiration @ home from the world outside.
